8

History/Social Studies

Bringing It All Together

of
13

Aligning Essential Questions and Sources

When designing an investigation, one of the most important considerations a teacher needs to make is the alignment among all the materials that students will use. Of primary concern is the alignment between the essential question being asked and the sources that students will use as evidence for making claims in response to the essential question.

As mentioned in Unit 5, Section 5, here are some criteria for deciding what makes for good essential questions. The best questions to guide inquiry:

Are complex and debatable

Require students to analyze texts

Necessitate that students move beyond summary

Are not answerable by a simple yes or no

Can have a range of answers and multiple interpretations

Another important issue is whether multiple perspectives are conveyed in a document set or whether the set is skewed toward one perspective. As a way of monitoring issues of alignment and equitable perspectives, the following questions can be asked:

Why did I select this document?

What do I expect students will get from this document?

How does the document relate to the essential question I posed?

What will be difficult for students in this document?

What have I done to help students access the document (e.g., adaptations of documents, scaffolding, etc.)?